Friday, August 6, 2010

CUMIN PULAO (JEERA RICE)

Today I thought of making one of my all time favourite North Indian dish, any guess??? What it could be??

It is cumin (jeera) rice. The aroma of jeera rice is wonderful. It is very simple to make and also a healthy food if prepared with less fat. Cumin seeds contain large amount of iron and has lots of medicinal effect. Basically the dish is more popular in Punjab but now days you will find it all over. Some of people add onion and ginger garlic paste in jeera rice but I never use, since I feel that jeera rice should have wonderful smell of jeera. The other reason that as I said in my earlier post that my in laws never prefer to eat garlic.That is why my recipe is little bit different and believes me it is as tasty as jeera rice with onion and ginger garlic paste. I make this dish with India Gate Basmati rice but again it is your own choice.

If you have got some unexpected guest at home then I think this will be a ideal choice for your lunch or dinner menu. Since it does not require lots of preparation and ingredients you can make this very quickly. So try this recipe:-

Cumin (Jeera Rice)

Preparation time: 5 minutes

Cooking time: 10 minutes

Serving: 4 persons

Ingredients

Basmati Rice-21/2 cup (Washed and soaked for half an hour)

Cumin (Jeera) Seeds-4 tbs

Butter-2 tbs or less

Salt-to taste

Hot water-4 3/4 cup

Clove-3

Cardamom-2

Bay leaf-1

Cinnamon Stick-1’ inch

Black cardamom-1

Javitri-1

Cashew nut-10-12

Raisine-10

Method

• Take a wide mouth of pan or pressure cooker.

• Heat butter in it with low medium heat.

• Put all gram masala in it.

• Fry in low flame.

• Then put cashew nut and raisin in it and fry till it turn to light pinkish colour.

• Then add cumin seeds (jeera) in it.

• When cumin seeds start changing its colour then add the soaked rice in it.

• Fry till you get nice smell of basmati rice.

• Then add hot water and salt in this.

• Cover the pan with lid and cook in low flame.

• If you use cooker then cook in low flame till you get one whistle.

• Serve hot with any north Indian side dish.

TIPS

• Don’t open the lid if pressure is inside the cooker. Let it get cool down its own.

• If you are cooking in open pan then keep checking the dish in between or else it might get burned.

• You can add little coriander leaves for garnishing the rice if you desire.